Multiple Suicide Attacks Cause Double-Digit Death Toll In Afghanistan

Suicide bombers struck in a normally peaceful area of southwestern Afghanistan today.

Reports are still coming in and details vary. But various officials are telling news outlets that there were multiple, seemingly coordinated, attacks. A spokesman for the government in Nimroz province tells NPR's Soraya Sarhaddi Nelson that more than 20 people were killed by a particularly deadly combination of events: one bomb went off in a bazaar and then a second bomber set off an explosion at a hospital where victims of the first attack had been taken. Another two would-be bombers were killed before they could set off their explosives, the official said.

The New York Times says it has been told by officials that at least 29 people are dead from those attacks in the city of Zaranj, and that the toll is likely to rise.

The Associated Press reports that the deputy police chief of Nimroz, Noor Ahmad Shirzada, says there were at least 14 would-be attackers and that more than 100 people were wounded.

Update at 12:55 p.m. ET. More Attacks.

CNN reports that there's been another attack and at least 14 more deaths: "In northeastern Afghanistan, a bomb blast at a bazaar in Kunduz province killed 10 people, while a Taliban ambush in Badakhshan killed a district police chief and three other officers, according to police officials."

Copyright 2012 National Public Radio. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.